


Thought Contagion

by itsalwayssunnyit



Category: Vampyr (Video Game)
Genre: Banter, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Mind bond
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-02
Updated: 2020-02-06
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:27:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22519219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/itsalwayssunnyit/pseuds/itsalwayssunnyit
Summary: All the reports and documents on the process of becoming a vampire provided little comfort when it was Geoffrey McCullum’s time to rise into this cursed existence. Jonathan Reid doesn't make it any easier, with all his grief and anger and pain bleeding into McCullum's consciousness in an unsteady stream of invasive feelings.Naturally, something's got to be done about it.Title's from Muse's Thought ContagionI'm putting this on hiatus for the foreseeable future because I have no idea where I'm going with it and I apologise
Relationships: Geoffrey McCullum/Jonathan Reid
Comments: 15
Kudos: 72





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm putting this on hiatus for the foreseeable future because I have no idea where I'm going with it and I apologise

When it was Geoffrey McCullum’s turn to rise into this cursed existence, all the reports and documents the Guard of Priwen had on the process of being turned into a vampire provided very little comfort. He knew to expect disorientation from his new senses, the feel of a completely new body, and, more importantly, the _thirst_.

Hell, his memories of that first night still bring a chill to his undead bones. He made a point of keeping to the sewers until he got a hold of himself, drank from rats and Skals until he as much like himself as he would ever feel again, thanks to Jonathan Reid.

It is a powerful thing, the bond between Maker and Progeny. McCullum had read about it, heard about it time and again, but the way Reid bleeds into his consciousness is still a shock. During his first weeks as an Ekon, he’d been able to sense Reid aching with a relentless drive to finish his quest and Geoffrey found himself filled to the brim with a sick desperation to make things right, to somehow offer penance for a guilt that doesn’t belong to him, not really, but that now lives inside him as well.

And then, silence. Blessed and cursed all at once. He saw Reid once before the good doctor left the city. At the time, Reid was looking for King Arthur’s blood, swearing that he could stop the epidemic, and then he buggered off after Lady Ashbury and, wherever it was her ladyship was hiding, it was far enough that Geoffrey was actually able to get through a day or two without feeling any emotions that did not belong to him.

The problem is that the silence, while a relief, also left Geoffrey completely alone, now, among his way too human comrades.

It is a Thursday, the night Jonathan comes back, and Geoffrey doesn’t immediately recognize his return for what it is. He wakes up feeling a tad weak. Drained, unease clogging his throat and a sadness he’d experienced only in his youth threatening to overcome him.

He thinks of his diseased family, then. Of the plague he hopelessly fights.

When he sits down for dinner with his comrades a few days later is when he feels the worst. He doesn’t even pretend to eat, ignores the concerned glances and doesn’t offer any explanations when his fellow guardsmen ask him what’s going on. The glare he shoots them alone deters any further prodding and, when the night is darkest, he goes out by himself to patrol the streets, but no amount of fighting or blood on his sword offer any comfort for his grief.

He feels like shit, but it’s only a week later, when someone mentions the return of that leech doctor to Pembroke Hospital that it clicks.

That _bastard_.

It’s a full moon, the night Geoffrey decides he’s had enough, Friday night blending into Saturday under the angry march of his feet through the cobblestone streets that lead the way to Pembroke Hospital. He enters the place as if he’s there every other day, following the invisible line that connects him to his Maker like a dog chasing a scent.

Pembroke is slowly but surely descending into chaos without Swansea in charge and no one looks at Geoffrey twice as he makes his way upstairs, his Maker’s discomfort a constant scratch in the back of his mind. He doesn’t knock when he reaches what he supposes to be Reid’s living quarters. The door is unlocked, but Geoffrey lingers at the doorway until Reid looks up from the workbench he’s been bent over and mutters a quiet, “You may enter.”

Geoffrey doesn’t move immediately. The voice he hears is almost unrecognizable, lacking its former strength and confidence completely. The entirety of Reid’s person is different, actually: not composed at all, strands of dark hair falling over his usually handsome face, beard messy, the blue in his eyes almost electric with how red with exhaustion they look.

It makes Geoffrey angry beyond any reason. The hunter takes one step inside and then another, and another, and then calmly demands, “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

Jonathan looks at him curiously, lifts a hand to push hair away from his face.

“What are you doing here?”

“I want to know what the fuck you think you’re doing!” Geoffrey snarls, arms crossed in what he hopes comes off as intimidating. “There’s a fucking epidemic wreaking havoc across London and you’re, what? Brooding in your room, feeling sorry for yourself? I knew you fucking leeches were pathetic, but this is a new low.”

Reid sighs and looks away. He has the decency to look ashamed, but that’s just a very small part of what Geoffrey feels through their bond.

“What is it to you?” Reid asks and it stings.

It shouldn’t.

Geoffrey takes a step closer and grabs Reid’s elbow to force him to look up. “Because I can feel it, you idiot.” Reid just blinks at him. The fact that he doesn’t pull away from Geoffrey’s grasp only fuels the hunter’s resentment. “ _You’re_ messed up in the head, Reid, and I’d appreciate you not messing around in my head as well, if it’s all the same to you.”

“W-what do you mean?” Reid seems to come out of his torpor for an instant, his disorientation hitting Geoffrey like a punch to the face. Geoffrey didn’t anticipate how it would feel to have Reid in such close proximity. He lets go of the doctor with a frown. “McCullum, I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“ _You_! Your grief. Shame, guilt, anger,” he could go on. “I can feel it all. All of it. You’re my Maker, all right, but I don’t need a new parent to fuck me up, thank you very much. I’d appreciate if you found a way to keep your emotions to yourself.”

It takes Reid a second or two to fully grasp what Geoffrey is saying, but when he does his face twists in embarrassment.

“I didn’t… I didn’t realise.” Geoffrey scoffs. At least Reid sounds honest. “I apologise for… Oh, I’m terribly sorry.”

Geoffrey raises a hand. Yeah, Reid _is_ sorry. He can feel it in his bones. “Don’t be… just…” He loses track of what he meant to say as those too bright eyes gaze into his own — how can such bright eyes carry so much darkness? Absentmindedly, Geoffrey finds himself wishing he had some way to make it go away. “Just fucking stop it. It’s all I ask.”

Geoffrey takes a step back, trying not to think of how difficult it is to step away now that he got so close to Reid. He clears his suddenly very tight throat.

“And if, while you’re at it, you might as well get your fucking head out of your arse and get to work, I’m sure the sick and dying people downstairs would appreciate it.” One more step back and Reid is stepping forward. Geoffrey runs a hand through his hair. “Stupid git.”

Geoffrey has to leave. He has to get out before he does something inhumanly unwise.

“I can’t.” Reid words, said through gritted teeth, cut through Geoffrey’s retreat. Geoffrey notices, then, that Reid’s eyes aren’t only red because of lack of sleep or whatever. There’s _death_ in them.

“You’ve killed someone…” Geoffrey realises aloud. He’s reaching for his pistol, ready to draw it. “Fucking leech… who?”

Reid shrugs helplessly. “Swansea. Lady Ashbury…” He pauses, unable to hold Geoffrey’s gaze, and the hunter can feel Reid actively trying to keep his heartache from bleeding over. “Nurse Crane… Sean Hampton… Aloysius Dawnson.”

“You have a goddamn kill list?” Geoffrey isn’t easily shocked, but he never expected Reid to be so forthcoming in his confession. “Elisabeth Ashbury?”

Reid rubs a hand over his unkempt beard and explains, “I didn’t… didn’t _kill_ her, but she died… because of me.”

Geoffrey would punch him in the face if he didn’t think that would somehow backfire. Instead, he says, “So? There’s actual living and breathing people downstairs who need your fucking help… get it together, for fuck’s sake.”

Geoffrey doesn’t know what does it, if something he said actually got through to Reid, but suddenly the unhappy buzz at the back of his mind is gone. Geoffrey sighs in relief.

“Thank you,” he says before he can regret it. He steps back and away from Reid, ready to take his leave.

“No. Thank _you_ , my progeny.”

Geoffrey is sure he’s not imagining the faint amusement in Reid’s voice. God, even the way he _speaks_ , like he’s savouring every word, gets on his nerves. He throws the doctor one last half-hearted glare and mutters, “Don’t push it, Reid.”


	2. Chapter 2

Geoffrey McCullum’s getting suspicious. London has been awful quiet for the past week or so —the Great Hunt on a hiatus, no bodies showing up in strange places, no signs of rogue beasts nesting anywhere. In the absence of Swansea, Dr. Ackroyd has taken over Pembroke Hospital and Geoffrey keeps hearing about that other doctor, the _leech_ , treating patients and curing illnesses left and right.

At least Reid’s keeping himself busy, Geoffrey thinks as he spends his nights patrolling the streets and feeding on random rats and the few Skals still hanging around. Despite how much he hunts and kills and drinks, though, Geoffrey doesn’t feel sated.

And, well, that’s not unusual, per se. The _thirst_ is, after all, never ending. He’s always known that. Lately, though, he’s been wondering if he’ll ever succumb to it and dive, half-crazed by hunger, fangs first into a human being.

Geoffrey is on his fifth or sixth rat of the night, thirst still clawing at the back of his skull, when he realises that these feelings, this _hunger_ , the constant dizziness and weakness that spreads through his body… well, they’re not exactly _his_.

 _That wanker_ , Geoffrey curses internally and, irritation boiling at his centre, shadow jumps out of his office window at the Priwen headquarters and onto the streets below, only one thing on his mind.

 _Reid_.

There’s a new moon tonight and the few stars visible above London’s smog seem oddly bright, but not bright enough to light the dark streets below as the hunter makes his way towards his Maker. When Geoffrey allows himself to _really_ focus on Reid, it’s almost too easy to find him. He just has to let himself follow that faint pull he always feels, the pull that usually leads him to Pembroke Hospital.

But not tonight, it seems. No, Reid seems to be out, tonight.

Geoffrey finds him standing in the middle of a bridge short on the way to Whitechapel, gazing hopelessly at the canal below. Even if Geoffrey couldn’t _feel_ Reid there, if he could not fucking _smell_ him across the distance, cologne and soap and antiseptic, he would have recognised him.

He would recognise him anywhere.

“Dr. Reid,” Geoffrey calls out even though he doesn’t have to. There’s no anger in his voice, just confusion.

His Maker had to know he was coming.

Jonathan turns to face him very slowly, eyes dark and his flesh a blueish pale, purple hungry veins standing out on his face and neck. He even _smells_ hungry which is insane because Geoffrey never knew hunger to have a distinct scent, but, again, there are so many things he never before realised had their own smell.

“Hunter.” Reid sounds surprised. “Have you come in peace?”

Geoffrey cocks his head, fights a faint indignation at the question. “You shouldn’t have to ask.”

“But I do. Aren’t we, as you say, creatures of deceit?” The way he says it, deceit, as they walk closer to each other, has the hairs on Geoffrey’s neck standing up.

Geoffrey responds with a question of his own, “What are you doing out here?”

“Couldn’t stand the hospital,” Reid replies very simply. He sounds genuine. And tired. _So_ very tired Geoffrey feels himself aching in sympathy. “It’s… _very_ bloody today.”

“You’re _thirsty_.” It’s an accusation. Jonathan avoids the hunter’s eyes as he nods. “Haven’t you fed?”

“I have.”

 _Liar_ , Geoffrey wants to snarl. “When?”

“I…” Reid hesitates before admitting, “I’m not sure.”

Geoffrey crosses his arms. Just his luck, getting _Reid_ as his Maker. The guy might be a miracle worker in an operating room, the most dangerous creature Geoffrey’s ever fought, but he’s pretty helpless when it comes to almost everything else.

“Why haven’t you been feeding?” Geoffrey demands. He feels like he’s about to lecture one of his rookies at Priwen — eat your damn food, don’t overindulge in drinking, get as much sleep as you can before patrolling the streets.

“I… I can’t…” Reid’s voice is noticeably weak. “The rats… The skals… I…”

A wave of revulsion hits Geoffrey, gone as quickly as it came as Reid gets a hold of himself.

“I’m not well, vampire hunter.” He avoids Geoffrey’s eyes. “I wish I had the guts to end this… cursed existence.”

Something cold settles into Geoffrey’s middle, the mere idea of Reid’s existence ending something unthinkable.

“Nonsense,” Geoffrey replies, a bit more harshly than he intended. It’s selfish, this bone-chilling fear that comes over him, and Reid might not see it for what it is because the doctor is looking at him with surprise in his eyes and through the bond Geoffrey feels a flare of… fondness.

He doesn’t know why he does it and later he’s going to keep asking himself what sort of idiot he has become to do something so reckless, but his sword is unsheathed before he can regret the impulse. He runs the sharp edge of the blade against his palm and blood spills from the cut, strangely warm against his cold skin. The rich metallic tang spreads around them and Geoffrey watches as the doctor’s nostrils flare, his pupils contracting and then dilating, a predator in every way it counts.

Geoffrey takes a step towards him with his bleeding hand raised, easy authority in his voice as he demands, “Drink.”

“Are you insane?” Jonathan asks, but his gaze is locked onto Geoffrey’s blood as if he can’t look away.

Geoffrey shoves his hand into Reid’s face with a warning Jonathan doesn’t really need.

“I won’t offer twice.”

Geoffrey both sees and _feels_ Reid’s resistance crumble. Jonathan’s lips part helplessly in a snarl and then close around the bleeding wound on Geoffrey’s palm, hands wrapping around Geoffrey’s wrist with unexpected gentleness. For an instant, their bond burns white-hot, unrepressed and all too disturbing — that tentative hope, hope and _want_ and ache, among so many dark things.

Sharp as Reid’s fangs are, he’s careful when he drink the blood from Geoffrey’s bleeding palm, his lips delicate and almost loving — wet tongue coaxing more blood out in electrifying little licks, he cradles Geoffrey’s hand between his own.

“That’s it, that’s it… there you go, now…” Geoffrey says approvingly as a wet tongue laps at his wrist trying to chase a runaway trickle of blood. “Have at it, Reid. Keep going.”

Reid is not quiet. These tiny sounds escape his parted lips, hungry little sighs and whimpers that Geoffrey _knows_ will haunt him later on when he’s all alone, trying to sleep. Reid stumbles against him and Geoffrey reaches with his free hand to manoeuvre them until he’s got Reid propped up against the side of the bridge, his grip tightening on Geoffrey’s wrist.

And Geoffrey must have a loose screw somewhere inside his head because he can feel himself getting hard, Reid’s desperation an unmooring sight, the sensation so intimate they might as well be shagging at this point.

Geoffrey wonders, absently, if Jonathan is always this _eager_ when he feeds, his dark lashes fluttering over almost closed eyes as if dreaming. Jonathan shifts his grip slightly, sucks a bit harder and Geoffrey groans.

There’s not an ounce of warmth in Geoffrey’s body but he feels like he’s burning.

The sound of Geoffrey’s groan seems to snap the doctor back to reality because he suddenly lets go of the hunter and steps back. He does so on unsteady feet, though, and Geoffrey finds himself reaching out with his uninjured hand in order to keep Reid from falling face-first onto the cobblestone beneath their feet.

“Better?” Geoffrey asks in a husky bark, eyes glued to his Maker’s scarlet-stained lips.

Geoffrey isn’t even sure if the licentious thoughts drifting through his brain are entirely his or a reflection of Reid’s own disjointed emotions. He doesn’t know which alternative he prefers because, really, this is the most alive he’s ever felt and isn’t that some fine irony there?

Reid inhales sharply, licking the blood from his lips, and nods, gravely. There’s a bit of blood on his beard and he still looks a bit dazed when he meets Geoffrey’s eyes.

Jonathan is not much shorter than Geoffrey, but he feels very small like this. Fragile. _Breakable_ , a sadistic voice supplies in Geoffrey’s mind and he’s crowding Jonathan in, sweeping a thumb under his Maker’s lower lip to gather the blood he missed.

Geoffrey’s own blood.

Geoffrey’s breath catches in his chest, undead heart tight as Reid’s tongue immediately darts out to lap at the hunter’s thumb, his artic-blue eyes too knowing, dangerous.

Geoffrey finds himself wanting to see how far he can bend Jonathan before he breaks, how loud or sharp he can make him moan and scream before pleasure is the only thing in his mind. He wants to ravage the proper and courteous Doctor Jonathan Reid and he’s about to kiss him, see, nose filled with the scent of his own blood on the other’s breath, but then he realises just _how much_ he wants it, his entire body practically vibrating from it, his desire echoes, resonating.

He never expected it to be this intense, his connection to Reid like a second heartbeat inside his chest.

Geoffrey forces himself to take a step back with a frustrated groan. He is lightheaded, but it’s not from blood loss. He’s fed recently, much more than he needed with Reid’s crazy hunger lingering on the back of his mind. No. This fog in his head is something else altogether.

“Don’t punish me by punishing yourself, doctor,” he finally says, taking another step back. It physically hurts to extricate himself from the other vampire, but his head feels a bit clearer now that he’s away.

“Geoffrey…” Jonathan begins but the hunter interrupts him:

“I can’t.” Even though every fibre of his body begs him to just follow his desire, Geoffrey slowly backs away. When he speaks next, it’s a dear request, “Don’t follow me.”


End file.
